US Averts Government Shutdown as Senate Passes GOP Spending Bill

The Senate passed a Republican spending plan Friday, averting a US government shutdown hours before a midnight deadline while exacerbating a furious struggle within the Democratic party over how to confront Donald Trump.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumerand a handful of other Democrats helped the Republican majority overcome a crucial procedural obstacle and pave the way for the funding’s approval.

Their actions relinquished what some believed was the party’s best leverage to impose constraints on Trump and Elon Musk’s mass firings of federal workers and wholesale elimination of federal agencies. Opponents will have to look instead to the courts.

Schumer, a 45-year veteran of Capitol Hill, made the pivotal choice Thursday evening less than 30 hours before the shutdown deadline, announcing he would drop a blockade of the spending bill rather than risk blame for an interruption of government services to the US public.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer, left, at the US Capitol Friday.

Photographer: Allison Robbert/Bloomberg

Schumer’s retreat and passage of the funding package is a political victory for Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson, who fought to ensure the measure placed no restraints on Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency cost—cutting crusade and maintained funding for the government through the Sept. 30 end to the federal fiscal year.

The game of chicken Democrats and Republicans waged over a potential shutdown played out as financial markets were roiled by Trump’s tariff campaign and hyper-sensitive to new disruption. By Thursday, the benchmark S&P 500 had fallen more than 10% in a three-week rout, meeting the threshold for a correction. The index rebounded Friday, surging more than 2%.

Nine Democrats and one independent allied with the party joined nearly all Republicans in the key procedural vote, overcoming a 60-vote threshold and paving the way for passage.

Shortly afterward, the Senate passed the measure 54 to 46. Democratic Senator Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire and Angus King, a Maine independent, joined Republicans in voting for the bill.

Senate Democrats argued for days among themselves about how to proceed on the funding. The closed-door debate reflected a fight within the party over how to challenge Trump after losing control of all elected branches of government in November.

The party’s dedicated progressive core voters are clamoring to take on Musk’s dismantling of parts of the federal government. Many moderates would rather wait to wage battle over protecting Medicaid and other broadly popular benefits and economic disruption they anticipate from Trump’s aggressive use of tariffs.

Schumer’s decision to drop the procedural blockade provoked furious criticism from Democrats.

That included former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who emerged as a focal point for resistance to Trump in his first term and retains so much influence in the party that she was instrumental in forcing President Joe Biden to abandon his reelection campaign.

“This false choice that some are buying instead of fighting is unacceptable,” she said in a statement denouncing the move without naming Schumer.

Read more: Pelosi Comes Out Against Schumer’s Government Shutdown Retreat

“Please grow a spine. And quickly,” Biden domestic chief policy adviser Susan Rice said in a social media post savaging Schumer. “Why should Dems roll over and play dead?”

House Democrats made clear they were fully against the House GOP plan and encouraged their swing district moderates to vote against it on Tuesday. They backed an alternative interim four-week funding plan, arguing it would buy time to negotiate restraints on Musk.

The bitter intra-party divide was reflected in the Senate procedural vote. Vulnerable moderate Democrats like Georgia’s Jon Ossoff, who is up for reelection in a Trump-won state next year, voted against dropping the blockade, as did moderates like Virginia’s Mark Warner and Arizona’s Mark Kelly. The vote will help shield them from potential primary challenges from progressives even as passage of the bill will shield them from blame for a shutdown.

Schumer loyalists like Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and the retiring Gary Peters of Michigan opted to take the heat from the party’s political base and voted to end a blockade on keeping the government open.

“Shutting the government down is not the answer,” said Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, another Democratic senator who joined with Schumer.

Schumer argued that a shutdown would damage the country as well as his minority party, taking the focus off economic pain caused by Trump’s tariffs.

“I don’t believe he will be as popular in September as he is today,” Schumer said. The line of reasoning mirrored an influential opinion essay by Democratic strategist James Carville who advised Democrats to “play dead” for a while and let Trump fail.

Trump, who still must sign the bill, praised Schumer in a social media post likely to stoke anger among the senator’s Democratic critics.

“Congratulations to Chuck Schumer for doing the right thing — Took ‘guts’ and courage!” Trump said. “This could lead to something big for the USA, a whole new direction and beginning!”

The Senate will now pivot to tax cuts, which are at the center of Trump’s legislative agenda. Democrats will have no ability to block that legislation, which cannot be filibustered.

--With assistance from Alicia Diaz.

To contact the reporters on this story:
Erik Wasson in Washington at ewasson@bloomberg.net;
Billy House in Washington at bhouse5@bloomberg.net;
Steven T. Dennis in Washington at sdennis17@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Megan Scully at mscully32@bloomberg.net

Mike Dorning

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